London | Amsterdam | Helsinki (11/19-11/29)

Thurs (10/19) – after only 3 hours of sleep and far too many Bull Hills (Red Bull + Sugar Hill beer), I had to get up and head to JFK for my flight to London. I crawled into the cab and quickly laid my head down on the back seat for a nap. About half way to JFK, I woke up suddenly and started screaming profanities…. Sh*t! Sh*t! Sh*t! … I forgot my passport! I was freaking out but the cabbie pulled a “U”ie and darted back to Chelsea and then back toward JFK. I made it *just* in time to check my bag and luckily preserved my “never missed a flight” status. Whew – that was close! I landed at Heathrow, hopped on the Tube to Angel through Kings Cross and was greeted on the street by KJ, Broen and a doner kebab. Yay! It had been way too long on all fronts. We spent the night catching up on gossip and sleep… as we knew a big weekend lie ahead.

Friday (10/20) – KJ went to work in the am so I was left to my own devices for the day. I had been to London many times before so wasn’t necessarily on a site-seeing crusade but decided to spend the day wandering around the city. I started things off with a mocha at a Café Mobile espresso cart (where I got grilled about the feasibility of such a cart in NYC) and then darted over to the London Bridge Tube stop for a walk along the Thames Path. I stopped at the Tower Bridge when I saw they had a Red Bull Experiment exhibit, showcasing Robbie Maddison’s recent back flip over the open bridge (web clip and pic). After that I walked and walked and walked until I realized that North Greenwich was probably too far to walk – even for me. A short Tube ride later, I was at the O2, the new entertainment complex which includes an arena, a nightclub (Matter, which is owned by the same people behind Fabric) and various other entertainment options. I had the choice between the Michael Jackson exhibit and the British Music Experience and opted for the latter given the contextual relevance. Overall it was great – although it may have been a bit interactive for its own good (or maybe I’m just lazy?). Ha.

After the O2, I ventured toward Soho and wandered for awhile longer. Along the way I walked past Busabi Eathai, a restaurant I had eaten at in 2001 on my very first trip out of the US. After that I met KJ for after dinner drinks at a funky little lounge called Graphic which rotates the work of various graphic designers. That night we grabbed some Turkish food in Angel and met up with Sami and Catherine for a low key night which ended on a particularly funny note: A wasted bloke was walking down the street toward us when all of the sudden his buddy shoved him (hard!) into a massive pile of empty boxes on the street. He was so drunk that he couldn’t move (let alone get up) and remained face down in the boxes for some time. Not to miss out on a good photo opportunity, me and the crew piled on more boxes and then proceeded to stand on the top, surfing on the wasted mess of a man below. I’m going to hell. Ha!

Sat (10/21) – KJ took me hat shopping at CA4LA in Shoreditch for a belated birthday present. We tried pretty much every hat in the joint before finally settling on our new lids. Goes without saying that KJ and my selections were quite different (-; After that we started a Bloody Mary and brunch crawl – stopping first at Cantaloupe and then at Breakfast Club before finally landing at Nir’s apartment. KJ and I let Nir go to the gym (someone’s gotta do it) and cabbed up to Camden for the Red Bull Street Style UK finals at St. Michael’s Church. (link). That night we had a DESLISH dinner at Elk in the Woods, got our pre-game on and then went to Fabric for the main event of the trip. We’re old and tired so we only lasted until 6am but not before catching Craig Richards, Jeremy P. Caufield, Zip, Pan Pot, Caesar & Disorder and Inland Knights. Fabric definitely lived up to its billing as world’s best sound system and all around amazing club – I can see why the Brits still venture out night after night for big room madness.

Sunday (10/22) – Laziest day ever: pay per view movies, Indian food and the couch.

Mon (10/23) – KJ was back to work so I decided to cruise over to Red Bull’s UK HQ right near the Tower Bridge to meet up with a colleague and check out their new digs and future site of RB Music Academy (Feb 2010). The afternoon was spent exploring Borough Market, eating Fish & Chips and walking, walking, walking until I couldn’t walk anymore. Since it was my last night in London, KJ, Broen, Sami, Catherine, Nir and Taj all gathered at a great tapas joint in Shoreditch where we sucked down Brandy sangria and pounded tapas like it was going out of style. yum, yum, yum. Then we had a final nightcap at Ottolinghi in Angel, where good friend Haim (aka Cam) is working.

Tues (10/24 & beyond)
Unfortunately the rest of the trip was not documented very well so I'll have to come back and edit this when I have some time to put *pen to paper*. In the meantime, just know that Amsterdam is amazing but not for any of the reasons everyone always talks about - ganja, red light district, etc. And... that my 24 hours in Helsinki was absolutely off the chain!

The highlights:
--Picked up by Red Bull local at the airport
--Stopped for afternoon drinks a super cool loungey hangout, Siltanen
--Toured the city's sights
--Got dropped off at a dope, boutique hotel, Klaus K
--Given clothing from a local company, Makia
--Taken out to a traditional Finnish dinner of meatballs and Brandy sauce at Tori
--Hit up a cool bar called Beetroot and drank Glögi (a wintery mulled wine drink with almonds and cranberries) and the most popular shot in Finland, Fishu (2 packs of ground up fisherman friends packets to ½ litre of vodka)
--Popped over to the 30th bday party of a few club owners at Motellet, rocked out a Mo-vember party at Klaus K and then made it to Redrum for Berghain resident, Ben Klock.
--Was very, very hungover for the long flight from Finland back to the US of A.